NYC Scene Report – duendita, Bird Streets, & Life On Other Planets

This week’s NYC Scene Report features duendita with a “big one,” Bird Streets advising us to “Run For Our Lives,” and the debut of Life On Other Planets.

* duendita – which is the performance moniker of Candace Lee Camacho, and is also the name of Camacho’s band – released two new singles this past month, “bassline,” and “big one,” and they are both a celebration.

Discussing the late night dance floor ready songs in a statement, duendita said, “My dear friend and collaborator Noah Becker made these beats, and we loved performing them live in harmony, so we decided to record all of our vocals on the track — Emily Akpan and Vanessa Camacho are featured vocalists. We’ve been performing together for the past seven years, so finally collaborating in the studio was so special. I went to the club five nights in a row, saw the sun rise every single morning, then wrote ‘big one.’ These tracks are made with a lot of love from my family and I to yours!”

To say “big one” captures the vibe of dancing until sunrise would be an understatement. duendita totally nailed it. Click play, and get into the groove.

* Bird Streets has been giving listeners a string of incredible singles leading up to next week’s release of his third LP, The Escape Artist, and the latest, titled “Run For Our Lives,” is yet another gem.

Discussing the indie pop-rock song in a statement, Bird Streets said, “‘Run For Our Lives’ has roots in the late ‘90s. I wrote the first few verses, but could never figure out where to go from there. I tried probably a dozen different choruses over the years – there are demos of a few of them – but nothing worked. I showed it to (producer) Jason (Falkner) when we were auditioning material for the record, and he offered up some chords and a melody. It was one of those chocolate-and-peanut-butter moments – his chorus was exactly what the song needed. I believe it was something he’d pitched for another artist that wasn’t used, so big thanks to whoever didn’t want it.”

The video for “Run For Our Lives” features members of the Brooklyn-based theatrical dance troupe The Love Show, and is a very fun romp. Check it out!

* Closing things out this week is the debut of a brand new musical project from longtime column fave Fiona Silver.

The project is named Life On Other Planets, and it sees her teaming with Autry Fulbright. With their debut EP, Is There Life On Other Planets, they’ve created a genre-bending, and genre-blending, groovy, spacey, jazzy sound, which they say has been inspired by hip-hop, shoegaze, the Madchester scene of the ‘90s, and dance music.

Personally, I’m blown away by how cool it is, and when you listen to the EP I think you’ll find Life On Other Planets is totally out of this world.

For more of the best of NYC’s indie music scene, come back next Wednesday, and check out the archives for previous columns.